Networking

Job Seekers, Lock Down Your Facebook NOW!

Job Seekers, Lock Down Your Facebook NOW!
You are at a job fair. You talk to a recruiter at a dream company who later sends you a “friend request” in Facebook. What do you do? Not adding them could offend them. But adding them could give them access to your private data. How do you deal with this? Because some companies and recruiters will try to “friend” you to get more information about your private life, you need to know how to add people but keep them restricted. Follow these easy directions to do this. Do it now! The risk of potential employers discounting you unfairly because of stupid (yet private) stuff on Facebook is VERY high — chances are almost 35 percent! Create a list. I’ve set up a list called “Limited Access.” You can call yours whatever you want. Change the settings for that list. Then I set the privacy settings in “Limited Access” so people in that group will NOT see my wall, photos, or anything else I deem private. You have to go into your privacy settings, choose custom settings, then add “Limited Access” to “Hide this from” on each part of Facebook’s features. I suggest you add “Limited Access” to hide from other people’s wall posts, your political views and photos you get tagged on. Facebook Job SearchGrandfather your old friends. Next, I take a look at my current friends list and see who I want to restrict access to. I add them to my “Limited Access” list. Add them, but restrict them. If someone sends me a friend request and I don’t know them well, or if I don’t want them to see photos of my Halloween party, I add them and then immediately drop them into “Limited Access.” Don’t worry. They’ll never know you’ve limited them. [This article was originally posted on an earlier date] Joshua Waldman helps frustrated job seekers leverage social media to find work FAST! He is the founder of CareerEnlightenment.com and the author of the new book, "Job Searching with Social Media for Dummies." Sign-up for his newsletter today and get access to his exclusive training videos for FREE.Read more » articles by this approved expert | Click here » if you’re a career expertPhoto credit: Shutterstock
Featured